Artificial Restrictions Marred 2nd Dist. Candidate Encounter

That didn't happen at last night's (Mar. 26) 2nd district Council candidate forum.

They also allowed the candidates to respond (rebut) statements by their opponents, a self-correction opportunity for campaign misstatements.

That didn't happen at last night's event either.

Our purpose here is to be constructive in hopes of changing these practices in future encounters.

Last night's event presented by the Downtown Residential Council had a superlative venue (spacious Museum of Latin American Art, thank you) but in our opinion was misguided by imposing the above two artificial restrictions.

Although it's often used, we dislike the filtration mechanism of 3 x 5 cards. In our opinion, when candidates seek public office, they should at minimum have to face the public's questions. Time constraints aren't a valid excuse; schedule enough time. Once in office ("behind the rail"), the now-candidate doesn't have to answer ANY questions. For the public, election time is "now or never"...and last night it was "not now."

However much worse was the organizers' announced premise that the event shouldn't be a debate...as if that would somehow be unsanitary. Since 1960, no candidate for President has been able to get away with that...but last night showed some candidates for LB City Council can.

Not allowing rebuttal/responses deprives candidates and public of a self-correcting function: the ability to respond to statements (or misstatements) by their opponents and/or highlight statements with which they respectfully disagree.

That was evident within seconds last night when Vice Mayor Lowenthal made the factually inaccurate assertion that the City Council hadn't cut core services. That's simply not true. In Sept. 2009 and 2010, the Council (9-0) cut 140 budgeted police officers, and in Sept. 2011 she joined a Council majority (6-3, Schipske, Gabelich, Neal) in cutting about 10 more. One may agree or disagree with that policy, but the practice of censoring candidate rebuttals in advance prevented opponents from saying, and the audience from hearing, whether the candidates do or not.

The ground rule also conceals another aspect of what the public has a right to know: whether the candidate can stand up for his/her positions when those positions are challenged. Vice Mayor Lowenthal is quite capable to taking care of herself on multiple issues, thank you...and her opponents had better be. The public deserves to hear that.

Again: our intention here is to apply a slight sting in hopes of constructive change in the future. If there is a runoff in the 2nd district (and others), we urge event organizers to base their candidate encounter groundrules on a famous First Amendment axiom: the cure for bad speech is more speech.